Airtel hikes call tariff by 20 percent in six circles
India’s largest mobile operator, Bharti Airtel has announced a shocking increase in some of its call tariff plans, up to 20%. The hike is effective in six circles including New Delhi, Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. Interestingly, the hike comes at a time when all the major brands are touting their services as “low-cost” and “ultra-cheap”.
According to TOI, the company has raised the prepaid tariff rates of its ‘Advantage’ pack. The Advantage pack subscribers will now have to shell out 60p per minute for local and STD calls to mobile phones and 90p for calls to landlines. In addition, the local and national SMSes will be charged at Rs. 1 and Rs. 1.50 respectively.
The current users will pay for new rates after the validity of incumbent voucher ends. NDTV reports that the most of the calls will now cost some 1.2p per second. Earlier, it cost 1paise per second. The company, however, hasn’t increased tariff of its Freedom pack, which is based on per second billing. It’s notable that Bharti is the second company to raise tariffs after Ta DoCoMo. Docomo prices were hiked in Tamil Nadu recently.
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The mobile operating companies have been previously trying to woo customers with their “ultra-cheap” and “free” offers. However, it seemed the companies had been bearing the brunt of that low-cost packages. From the mobile network operators’ point of view, such packages haven’t helped them push their revenues much as they would have liked. The advent of 3G and mobile network portability have only added a headache for them. And adding to their woes, TRAI has been periodically coming up with new regulations. Other telecom players are most likely to follow the suit.
However, it is quite surprising that Airtel is the first one to announce such a hike. The company according to figures added some 2.12 million mobile subscribers in the month of June, staying on top as the largest operator in India.
Separately, Bharti Airtel and Ericsson have signed a five-year deal under which Ericsson will manage and optimise Airtel’s mobile networks in Africa. It’s notable that it will Ericsson’s first multi-country managed services deal in Africa. Its assistance is likely to help Airtel concentrate on its main operations of launching new products, services and apps for some 44 million subscribers in the continent.